Vanderbilt to probe instructor over math question accusing Israel of occupation
‘From the river to the sea, Palestine (…) was approximately 100 km. in 1946,’ read the problem given to calculus students; Nashville school says it has been removed
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JTA — Vanderbilt University has launched an inquiry into a mathematics lecturer whose classroom exercise accusing Israel of occupying Palestinian territory drew criticism from the activist group StopAntisemitism.
Tekin Karadağ, a senior lecturer at the university’s department of mathematics, drew the ire of the social media-focused antisemitism watchdog after it obtained a slide from one of his lectures that used an anti-Israel protest slogan and suggested that the territory that is now Israel rightfully belonged to a Palestinian state.
“Assume Palestine as a state with a rectangular land shape. There is the Mediterranean Sea on the west and the Jordan River on the east,” read the slide. “From the river to the sea, Palestine (…) was approximately 100 km. in 1946. The land decreases by 250 sq. km/year, due to the occupation by Israel. How fast is the width of the land decreasing now?”
Karadǎg, a Turkish national who received his PhD from Texas A&M University in 2021, included the question under “examples related to the popular issues” in a survey of calculus class, according to StopAntisemitism, which charged in a post on X that Karadǎg was “bringing his anti-Israel, antisemitic bias into his classroom.”
In a statement shared with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Vanderbilt said that the content had been removed and that an inquiry had been launched into Karadağ.
“The university has received reports alleging a member of the faculty engaged in unprofessional conduct related to content shared during course instruction,” the school said. “The content in question has been removed, and a formal inquiry has been initiated consistent with relevant university policy.”
Vanderbilt University – why is mathematics lecturer Tekin Karadǎg bringing his anti-Israel, antisemitic bias into his classroom?
This is unacceptable @VanderbiltU @VU_Chancellor pic.twitter.com/pGqC6fDveu
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) February 21, 2026
In recent years, rhetoric about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on US college campuses has grown increasingly fraught, with professors’ commentary on the region drawing heavy scrutiny and, at times, disciplinary measures when their universities have determined that they exceeded the bounds of academic freedom.
A recent report by Columbia University’s antisemitism task force found that students frequently experienced pro-Palestinian advocacy in classes entirely unrelated to the Middle East — such as dance or math classes.
The inquiry was not the first time that Vanderbilt, in Nashville, Tennessee, took swift action against the expression of pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel sentiments on its campus.
In March 2024, the university, which has roughly 1,100 Jewish undergraduate students, was among the first universities to expel students who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. This year, the school’s “grade” on handling antisemitism from the Anti-Defamation League was bumped up from a “C” to an “A.”
Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
The Times of Israel Community.